Overall  Impressions - We broke this group's overall into visual appeal an overall value of the site for a typical visitor.

• How attractive is a site?
• Is it easily navigable?
• Is it focused on customers needs or corporate ego?
• Is there value there for a visitor?
• Are local offices easily found?
• Is there a clear communication of their basic business?

In reviewing these firms we also took into account that their websites need to serve a multitude of audiences - customers, prospects, investors, analysts and the media. The problem with this is that in trying to be a jack of all trades they often master none of them.

Also many failed at a simple description of what they do - often seeming to be afraid to say they are insurance brokers and using a lot of words to say everythng but that.

If you take commissions or fees for the placement of any type of insurance or financial products you are a broker. It's okay to be a broker!

As you can see the only firms whose sites fail our test completely are the banks - as their sites are nice if you have a bank account or mortgage with them but useless for insurance. Yes they have special insurance sites but they still are tough to use. There are a lot of great firms owned by Wells especially whose identity has been subsumed into this this large corporation (with the best logo ever). BB&T's strategy of being a player in lots of small local markets probably benefits from their name whereas Wells Fargo may not competing in the larger US cities.

Of the traditonal brokers Brown and Brown and USI both fail to deliver a site that supports the quality of their organizations. The cheetah growl for Brown and Brown's site serves no purpose and USI's site is as bland as is their description of their business - "diversified insurance and financial services firm focused on providing fully integrated distribution of general and specialty property and casualty insurance and financial services such as employee benefits outsourcing and related consulting."

NFP also once again baffles me. Their site is very attractive but fails completely to explain to a potential customer why they add value. Their description of who they are is odd as well - "...distribution of financial services products". This is the same firm as you recall from a prior post whose CEO refers to "same store sales" and dealing with "product manufacturers" in her annual report investor communication.

Gallagher's site falls victim to the trying to be all things to all people, though they do have sites for the benefits and P&C businesses those are not where one goes when looking for them. Gallagher too has acquired a lot of great firms and subsumed their sites into generic pages like this one for The Stanton Group in Minneapolis. Stanton was a top 10 firm in Minneapolis Google ratings, the only one Gallagher had other than their headquarters address. 

Hub and CBIZ do a very nice job overall in looking fresh, getting their message across and getting the viewer to the local office to service them.Good solid sites here that you can build on to make even more useful and visible on the web.

I have become a fan of "no nonsense" sites that simply tell you what they do and then do it. Segal does that well at the same time being attractive, easy to navigate and clear on why they provide customer value.They also have RSS feeds easily accessible for communication.

The new Lockton site does the same thing. It is very businesslike but upfront on who they are and what they do - "Global insurance, employee benefits, surety and risk management services for clients interested in the highest level of service." It is well organized and even employs "Share This" to allow viewers to post pages to multiple social media tools, the only site to show any visible interest in the use of social media. With a few tweaks here and there they could have the best and most visible brokerage site on the web.

Now the big 3 - Willis/HRH, Marsh and AON. In all 3 cases we used the description of their business from their websites. All 3 approach their web presence different reflecting different business cultures.

The Willis site is well designed and very attractive - flashy -  but other than bragging about the Sears Tower or promoting a speech by their CEO seems to lack any real substance and their mission is vague -

"Bold. Dynamic. Driven. This is Willis."

Marsh is sort of straightforward:

"As the world's leading insurance broker and risk advisor, Marsh is devoted to finding the opportunity in risk."

But their Mercer brand gets a bit less so-  "Mercer is the global leader for trusted HR and related financial advice, products and services."  Their site tagline - "Consulting, Outsourcing and Investments" only confuses the issue more. 

The MMC websites seem intent on offering lots of information - all at one time and thus are very confusing.

Aon is by far the most focused and describes itself very directly regardless of the product areas you are in:

"... the leading global provider of risk management services, insurance and reinsurance brokerage, and human capital consulting."

The Aon site is the cleanest and is well designed and as we will see in future posts they are the only one of all these brokerage firms that seems to have any type of cohesive integrated web strategy.

A Contrast And Comparison

Now my final site for this first post - United Benefit Advisors (UBA). The only overall "4" ranking I gave. They are the David among the Goliaths here.

I am sure many of you readers from the large firms reviewed here are snickering at this comparison but be sure you read what is said here in its entirety.

Comparing UBA directly to all the largest US brokerage firms is impossible on one level - size - but very realisitic in terms of how an employer, looking for a real partner to help them would view them and their "local offices" or member firms.

The reason I included them is that their firms compete solely in the employee benefits part of the business. Some are very small, most are mid sized and a few are larger. How each member firm's expertise stacks up to all the other benefits brokers in their markets I cannot say but their local approach is much more friendly and engaging than the Borg-like websites of the national brands.

To start with UBA describes themselves in a different and interesting way:

"Shared Wisdom. Powerful Results."

"..a unique community of nearly 140 of the most successful and most trusted independent employee benefits advisory firms in North America..."

Unlike any of the other broker websites their "corporate" site exists to promote their local member's presence and expertise. How do I get referrals to the right member as fast as possible - not let me tell you all about me then make you search all over our site for a local office. They are everything an NFP is not.

Their site is clear on UBA's mission -the value they add for firms. If a prospect clicks on the UBA logo on a member's website they see exactly the value adds that they will get from their local broker being part of this organization. For example The lead item on their site is also employer focused and forward thinking:

Electronic Distribution of SPDs and other Participant Communications:
As e-mail, IM, and Twitter become the norm, and with "green" being the color of the day, benefit plan sponsors and administrators are naturally interested in meeting their participant communication obligations via electronic means. Unfortunately, the applicable statutes and regulations have not kept up with reality.

Their local firms have some of the best websites we have reviewed  - and a great many that are not - but at least the main UBA site gets a well informed viewer delivered to the local "door" - that is their job or reinforces what they saw on the local site in terms of the tools they provide customers. At that point the local firm has to be ready to deliver.

This type of umbrella site to a nice local web presence is the way all the large firms sites should operate to help drive business locally and raise their web visibility locally.

Don't laugh - more UBA firms are in the top 10 in their local market on Google than any of the national firms.

Per the BI survey this is still a relationship business done at a local level...

Tomorrow - "Googleability